Identifying A Black Swan Event
Based on the author's criteria:
- The event is a surprise (to the observer).
- The event has a major effect.
- After the first recorded instance of the event, it is rationalized by hindsight, as if it could have been expected; that is, the relevant data were available but unaccounted for in risk mitigation programs. The same is true for the personal perception by individuals.
An example Taleb uses to explain his theory is the events of September 11, 2001. 9/11 was a shock to many observers. Its ramifications continue to be felt in many ways: increased levels of government control; "preventive" strikes or wars by Western governments. The coordinated, successful attack on the World Trade Center and The Pentagon using commercial airliners was virtually unthinkable to many at the time. However, with the benefit of hindsight, it has come to be seen as a predictable incident in the context of the changes in terrorist tactics.
Read more about this topic: Black Swan Theory
Famous quotes containing the words identifying, black, swan and/or event:
“And the serial continues:
Pain, expiation, delight, more pain,
A frieze that lengthens continually, in the lucky way
Friezes do, and no plot is produced,
Nothing you could hang an identifying question on.”
—John Ashbery (b. 1927)
“The secret lies, I think, in his intimate knowledge of the people he is addressing be they black or white, and in the forthrightness with which he speaks of those things which hurt and baffle them.... He allows them their self-respect—indeed, he insists on it.”
—James Baldwin (1924–1987)
“I have seen this swan and
I have seen you; I have seen ambition without
understanding in a variety of forms.”
—Marianne Moore (1887–1972)
“The vanishing volatile froth of the present which any shadow will alter, any thought blow away, any event annihilate, is every moment converted into the Adamantine Record of the past.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)